denverpilot
Tied Down
Hey Nick... Guess what? Ha.
I'm that annoying driver that sets the cruise at the speed limit and leaves it there. I've done the math. There's no point in speeding. You'll get there about three minutes ahead of me.
Anyway, last year on the dirt county road north of the house, I got a ticket. This was because it isn't marked at all other than a sign right at the corner where you enter and you're looking left to make sure no one is coming. No other signage for 4 and a half miles. The neighbors had all said, "That's the summer short cut. It's awful in winter but it's not bad in the summer and you can do 50 on it." Cool. Up to the dirt, the pavement is marked 50. It's not a stretch out here to think it continues. It also goes toward work instead of backtracking. It's one of only three roads out of here.
I waved at a pickup truck and then saw it do a U-turn behind me. Very rare out here and I thought "that's weird", until the hidden LED lights in the grill came on. Oh. Bummer. Ok.
The truck was the Sheriff's brother who's listed as a "Special Investigator" and I suspect he and the other guy in the truck were just coming back from Court or someplace else in "the city" and here this country bumpkin waves and smiles at them doing 50 in a 40 on a dirt road in a Subaru. I interrupted their trip I guess. Ha. Well, whatever.
I took my lumps and just mailed in the thing. (See Nick's thread about how useless it is to go to traffic court in Colorado.)
Now for background, I've got a 74 mile round trip commute. If I were a bad driver or regularly speeding, by the law of averages, I would have a pile of tickets. A big pile. That doesn't include trips to the store or airport or anything else. A typical day can be over 100 miles of driving. Easy.
Anyway, that was last year. In October the County decided to pave "the summer short cut". They're not done yet. It's May. The latest estimate is June. LOL. 4.5 miles.
As you can imagine, whoever the contractor on this thing is, is bottom dollar. Signage and communication of what they're doing isn't exactly a high priority. Sometimes they're out there really working, other times half the signs and cones are fallen over and no one has been out there for weeks. Weather is a major factor, of course. They just don't even show up if it's precipitating.
Signage has been "interesting". They plastic wrapped the county speed limit signs (Two. One one way, one at the other end for the other way..). Then they put up the temporary stuff. "Fines doubled in work zone" and once in a while a "25 MPH" sign. And then the wind blows it over or they put it so far out in the ditch you might not even notice it. And they move it all around depending on where they are in this 4.5 miles.
They've also at times set up one of those one-way traffic lights and marked it "Wait time 11:20". Sat through that thing many times while watching multiple cars blow through it and those that blow it, just deal with pulling over if they happen to encounter opposite direction traffic.
Other times they have flag men and women.
In other words, typical country road building and totally spastic.
Whether they're out there or not, I don't speed. Yes, I do see idiots flying through there at 55+. Especially after dark.
Friday I am putting along on the new pavement, cruise set at 40, (enjoying the lack of washboards) and I come up on a big dude in a lime green vest and a car parked in the dirt off the side. Cars parked all along this road are common, that's what the construction workers do a quarter mile or so from any work going on. The road has curves and hills and you can't really see large distances down it at any point along it.
No markings on the Charger parked in the ditch. No large letters saying "Sheriff" on the vest. I'm so used to flag men at this point, I pull up in front of him and stop, awaiting an indication to go. He doesn't have a stop sign nor a radio. That's weird.
Then he points at the ditch in front of his car. I do a double take, and nod toward the ditch, like "you want me to go around you in the ditch?" and then I finally see about a 3" or 4" "badge" logo silkscreened on his vest and start to notice there's a uniform hiding underneath that huge lime green 3XL. Ohhhh.
I pull over and roll the window down and kill the wife's barbershop quartet on the stereo.
"Go ahead and hand me your license and registration and proof of insurance and pull up a little more over there and then we'll talk."
Ahhh crap. Ok.
Hand him the stuff. He reads the insurance while still in my hand and says he can see it's good and doesn't even want it. He walks to his unmarked car. Comes back. Standard lines about "people driving through the work zone too fast" and what not. I just let him talk. I'm in no hurry and arguing roadside is useless anyway. Plus I was having a nice day.
He asks, "Where have I seen this vehicle before?" Ha. Do they teach fishing classes at cop school? I just smile and shrug. Why would I answer that even if I knew. (I mean seriously, all my smart ass brain is thinking is, "Your house last night?" Or, "Oh lots of places. I'm kinda a big deal." LOL. I sure as hell wasn't going to say any of the funny **** that was running through my head. Luckily my brain to mouth filter was active.)
Smile and nod.
Here's where it gets almost comical. He hands me a fancy new ticket from what's apparently a new printer system in the cruisers. Last year it was the usual "push hard you're making three copies" note pad type of thing. He starts to explain it and I'm showing zero expression while I think, "You guys need printers you give out that many tickets? No wonder I just got a $50,000 property tax assessment increase. That **** being installed in all the vehicles and the data plan to hook it all up, isn't even close to cheap or cost-effective." Again, filter active.
Apparently this printer thing is a big deal to the country bumpkins. Long explanation of how to read ensues. I'm smiling and enjoying the sunshine and figure I can probably handle reading it later. Try not to yawn.
He also points out a card stuck to the back of the thing in four color print that has some private website on it. "And we are in the 21st Century now. You can pay online." (And I bet there's an 8% surcharge for that company to get paid and a huge kickback or the company is owned by someone related to someone, I'm thinking but not saying. Yay filter! I've never seen this company before and I'm still thinking about researching how they got chosen as the vendor for the County, but I know how this stuff works out here and I'm sure there was a no-bid contract granted.)
Now let me note that even though I wasn't consciously aware of it, I haven't seen a single construction worker or any work being done on this silly road anywhere today. They finished paving it a week or two ago. All that's left is to put up permanent signage, paint it, and it's done. Finding it completely empty is common.
In the middle of handing me the ticket he turns around and points at a vehicle that went by a minute ago and is down around he corner and a hill... "I really wanted that guy! That black SUV."
Great, I think. Tear up that thing in your hand and go get him. He probably speeds through here every day from the size of that hard on. I'm cool with that. (Yay, More filter. More smiling and nodding.)
He's honestly a nice guy. After the license, registration, and ticket are in hand, we must have talked for another five-ten minutes. While handing me the ticket he says, "You've been really calm through this. Probably the calmest person I've pulled over all day! [long legal explanation of ticket and court and la la la]... And just going to point out something here, this fine is not as high as it could be. Since this is a work zone, it could be doubled but just applying a little common sense, as you can see, they're on a break or something (not a soul in sight and not even any heavy equipment anywhere - they weren't on a break, they were long gone on a Friday around noon) so I didn't add that. Some folks this morning got the full $380 or whatever and they weren't happy."
Yeah, "whatever". I think the median income is about $45k a year out here for the majority of folks. You just gave them a ticket as large as their monthly grocery bill on a empty construction site that's come and gone for almost six months. No wonder they're ****ed.
(Yay, filter. Again. Smile and nod.)
"Oh and note that besides the fine there's State fees." Oh yes. We have a law here that new taxes are illegal unless voted on, but the State Office of Information Technology figured out how to get around that a long time ago. It's a computer processing fee. So glad you guys added those cruiser printers. I know multiple people who work for OIT and they're rolling in money nowadays. Best thing that ever happened to them. You should see how much the statewide digital radio system cost. Motorola has the state bent over and is pumping hard. That's what the kids from Schaumburg do. (Yay more filter... Smile and nod.)
Well at least I have that going for me. I finally speak up, "I suspect that they're upset because this road has been under construction with different rules and stuff since October. I drive the speed limit and set my cruise everywhere, and as your noted on the ticket, I was doing 41. The usual speed limit here. I watch people blow by me speeding like maniacs every day of the week during my commute in the city."
Now it gets even weirder...
"Oh yeah. You're bait! Even my kid knows that now. He sees someone being passed who's doing the speed limit and he points and says, 'Look daddy! Bait!'"
Now I'm just speechless. I thank him for "keeping us all safe out here" and I decide to see how good his training is, I offer a handshake. (Hand in sight from the wheel to the window but still...) He shakes it. Bad training. Oh well. Just curious. I honestly offered the shake, and wasn't insincere about it, but I know he shouldn't have taken my hand. His backup is a looooong way off. He's got to be new. No wonder he drew traffic duty on an empty road at the far end of the county.
Anyway, more chit chat about the weather, "At least it's nice out!" and he says, "Oh if it was raining I would just sit in the car with my lights on.", great. Now I wish it had been raining. (Yay, filter!)
"Have a nice day, don't let this ruin your weekend.", and I'm off.
He wrote it up as a Suburban (it's a Yukon and well badged) and he typed in my ham radio plates and put "O" instead of "0", as usual. Which also means he ran the wrong plate and he had to type in he vehicle type because he couldn't figure out why my vehicle didn't come up on he new toys in the car. Yay technology. A dispatcher would have caught that. The computer just made him less safe. I could have had warrants. Might be why he asked the weird question about where he had seen the vehicle. Ha. Diplomatic plates! You saw me at the consulate. LOL. Well whatever. One less "hit" on those plates in the database somewhere. Fine by me.
Computers make everything better. Databases even more so. Dont'cha'know?
So... $169 to just auto-plea it and two points. Or I go waste a day in Court in August and roll the dice, which won't probably change a thing and may cost more.
Doing the math for how often I've seen LE on that road now, (once a year), I should just speed. I'm sure that's why everyone else does. But I won't.
37 gallons of Avgas and that assumes my insurance doesn't go up. And the world is safe from a guy doing 40 on an empty road with no construction going on.
Just typed it up for the fun of all the "filtered" thoughts. There were more.
I'm that annoying driver that sets the cruise at the speed limit and leaves it there. I've done the math. There's no point in speeding. You'll get there about three minutes ahead of me.
Anyway, last year on the dirt county road north of the house, I got a ticket. This was because it isn't marked at all other than a sign right at the corner where you enter and you're looking left to make sure no one is coming. No other signage for 4 and a half miles. The neighbors had all said, "That's the summer short cut. It's awful in winter but it's not bad in the summer and you can do 50 on it." Cool. Up to the dirt, the pavement is marked 50. It's not a stretch out here to think it continues. It also goes toward work instead of backtracking. It's one of only three roads out of here.
I waved at a pickup truck and then saw it do a U-turn behind me. Very rare out here and I thought "that's weird", until the hidden LED lights in the grill came on. Oh. Bummer. Ok.
The truck was the Sheriff's brother who's listed as a "Special Investigator" and I suspect he and the other guy in the truck were just coming back from Court or someplace else in "the city" and here this country bumpkin waves and smiles at them doing 50 in a 40 on a dirt road in a Subaru. I interrupted their trip I guess. Ha. Well, whatever.
I took my lumps and just mailed in the thing. (See Nick's thread about how useless it is to go to traffic court in Colorado.)
Now for background, I've got a 74 mile round trip commute. If I were a bad driver or regularly speeding, by the law of averages, I would have a pile of tickets. A big pile. That doesn't include trips to the store or airport or anything else. A typical day can be over 100 miles of driving. Easy.
Anyway, that was last year. In October the County decided to pave "the summer short cut". They're not done yet. It's May. The latest estimate is June. LOL. 4.5 miles.
As you can imagine, whoever the contractor on this thing is, is bottom dollar. Signage and communication of what they're doing isn't exactly a high priority. Sometimes they're out there really working, other times half the signs and cones are fallen over and no one has been out there for weeks. Weather is a major factor, of course. They just don't even show up if it's precipitating.
Signage has been "interesting". They plastic wrapped the county speed limit signs (Two. One one way, one at the other end for the other way..). Then they put up the temporary stuff. "Fines doubled in work zone" and once in a while a "25 MPH" sign. And then the wind blows it over or they put it so far out in the ditch you might not even notice it. And they move it all around depending on where they are in this 4.5 miles.
They've also at times set up one of those one-way traffic lights and marked it "Wait time 11:20". Sat through that thing many times while watching multiple cars blow through it and those that blow it, just deal with pulling over if they happen to encounter opposite direction traffic.
Other times they have flag men and women.
In other words, typical country road building and totally spastic.
Whether they're out there or not, I don't speed. Yes, I do see idiots flying through there at 55+. Especially after dark.
Friday I am putting along on the new pavement, cruise set at 40, (enjoying the lack of washboards) and I come up on a big dude in a lime green vest and a car parked in the dirt off the side. Cars parked all along this road are common, that's what the construction workers do a quarter mile or so from any work going on. The road has curves and hills and you can't really see large distances down it at any point along it.
No markings on the Charger parked in the ditch. No large letters saying "Sheriff" on the vest. I'm so used to flag men at this point, I pull up in front of him and stop, awaiting an indication to go. He doesn't have a stop sign nor a radio. That's weird.
Then he points at the ditch in front of his car. I do a double take, and nod toward the ditch, like "you want me to go around you in the ditch?" and then I finally see about a 3" or 4" "badge" logo silkscreened on his vest and start to notice there's a uniform hiding underneath that huge lime green 3XL. Ohhhh.
I pull over and roll the window down and kill the wife's barbershop quartet on the stereo.
"Go ahead and hand me your license and registration and proof of insurance and pull up a little more over there and then we'll talk."
Ahhh crap. Ok.
Hand him the stuff. He reads the insurance while still in my hand and says he can see it's good and doesn't even want it. He walks to his unmarked car. Comes back. Standard lines about "people driving through the work zone too fast" and what not. I just let him talk. I'm in no hurry and arguing roadside is useless anyway. Plus I was having a nice day.
He asks, "Where have I seen this vehicle before?" Ha. Do they teach fishing classes at cop school? I just smile and shrug. Why would I answer that even if I knew. (I mean seriously, all my smart ass brain is thinking is, "Your house last night?" Or, "Oh lots of places. I'm kinda a big deal." LOL. I sure as hell wasn't going to say any of the funny **** that was running through my head. Luckily my brain to mouth filter was active.)
Smile and nod.
Here's where it gets almost comical. He hands me a fancy new ticket from what's apparently a new printer system in the cruisers. Last year it was the usual "push hard you're making three copies" note pad type of thing. He starts to explain it and I'm showing zero expression while I think, "You guys need printers you give out that many tickets? No wonder I just got a $50,000 property tax assessment increase. That **** being installed in all the vehicles and the data plan to hook it all up, isn't even close to cheap or cost-effective." Again, filter active.
Apparently this printer thing is a big deal to the country bumpkins. Long explanation of how to read ensues. I'm smiling and enjoying the sunshine and figure I can probably handle reading it later. Try not to yawn.
He also points out a card stuck to the back of the thing in four color print that has some private website on it. "And we are in the 21st Century now. You can pay online." (And I bet there's an 8% surcharge for that company to get paid and a huge kickback or the company is owned by someone related to someone, I'm thinking but not saying. Yay filter! I've never seen this company before and I'm still thinking about researching how they got chosen as the vendor for the County, but I know how this stuff works out here and I'm sure there was a no-bid contract granted.)
Now let me note that even though I wasn't consciously aware of it, I haven't seen a single construction worker or any work being done on this silly road anywhere today. They finished paving it a week or two ago. All that's left is to put up permanent signage, paint it, and it's done. Finding it completely empty is common.
In the middle of handing me the ticket he turns around and points at a vehicle that went by a minute ago and is down around he corner and a hill... "I really wanted that guy! That black SUV."
Great, I think. Tear up that thing in your hand and go get him. He probably speeds through here every day from the size of that hard on. I'm cool with that. (Yay, More filter. More smiling and nodding.)
He's honestly a nice guy. After the license, registration, and ticket are in hand, we must have talked for another five-ten minutes. While handing me the ticket he says, "You've been really calm through this. Probably the calmest person I've pulled over all day! [long legal explanation of ticket and court and la la la]... And just going to point out something here, this fine is not as high as it could be. Since this is a work zone, it could be doubled but just applying a little common sense, as you can see, they're on a break or something (not a soul in sight and not even any heavy equipment anywhere - they weren't on a break, they were long gone on a Friday around noon) so I didn't add that. Some folks this morning got the full $380 or whatever and they weren't happy."
Yeah, "whatever". I think the median income is about $45k a year out here for the majority of folks. You just gave them a ticket as large as their monthly grocery bill on a empty construction site that's come and gone for almost six months. No wonder they're ****ed.
(Yay, filter. Again. Smile and nod.)
"Oh and note that besides the fine there's State fees." Oh yes. We have a law here that new taxes are illegal unless voted on, but the State Office of Information Technology figured out how to get around that a long time ago. It's a computer processing fee. So glad you guys added those cruiser printers. I know multiple people who work for OIT and they're rolling in money nowadays. Best thing that ever happened to them. You should see how much the statewide digital radio system cost. Motorola has the state bent over and is pumping hard. That's what the kids from Schaumburg do. (Yay more filter... Smile and nod.)
Well at least I have that going for me. I finally speak up, "I suspect that they're upset because this road has been under construction with different rules and stuff since October. I drive the speed limit and set my cruise everywhere, and as your noted on the ticket, I was doing 41. The usual speed limit here. I watch people blow by me speeding like maniacs every day of the week during my commute in the city."
Now it gets even weirder...
"Oh yeah. You're bait! Even my kid knows that now. He sees someone being passed who's doing the speed limit and he points and says, 'Look daddy! Bait!'"
Now I'm just speechless. I thank him for "keeping us all safe out here" and I decide to see how good his training is, I offer a handshake. (Hand in sight from the wheel to the window but still...) He shakes it. Bad training. Oh well. Just curious. I honestly offered the shake, and wasn't insincere about it, but I know he shouldn't have taken my hand. His backup is a looooong way off. He's got to be new. No wonder he drew traffic duty on an empty road at the far end of the county.
Anyway, more chit chat about the weather, "At least it's nice out!" and he says, "Oh if it was raining I would just sit in the car with my lights on.", great. Now I wish it had been raining. (Yay, filter!)
"Have a nice day, don't let this ruin your weekend.", and I'm off.
He wrote it up as a Suburban (it's a Yukon and well badged) and he typed in my ham radio plates and put "O" instead of "0", as usual. Which also means he ran the wrong plate and he had to type in he vehicle type because he couldn't figure out why my vehicle didn't come up on he new toys in the car. Yay technology. A dispatcher would have caught that. The computer just made him less safe. I could have had warrants. Might be why he asked the weird question about where he had seen the vehicle. Ha. Diplomatic plates! You saw me at the consulate. LOL. Well whatever. One less "hit" on those plates in the database somewhere. Fine by me.
Computers make everything better. Databases even more so. Dont'cha'know?
So... $169 to just auto-plea it and two points. Or I go waste a day in Court in August and roll the dice, which won't probably change a thing and may cost more.
Doing the math for how often I've seen LE on that road now, (once a year), I should just speed. I'm sure that's why everyone else does. But I won't.
37 gallons of Avgas and that assumes my insurance doesn't go up. And the world is safe from a guy doing 40 on an empty road with no construction going on.
Just typed it up for the fun of all the "filtered" thoughts. There were more.
Last edited:
